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8/3/2017

EconomicDevelopment

Entrepreneurs Redefine FinTech with AI, Blockchain and More

Two international and eight U.S. teams completed the VC FinTech Accelerator Empowered by FIS yesterday and presented their solutions to more than 350 investors, including banking and financial services executives from across the U.S,. at VC FinTech Demo Day.

Held at the Clinton Presidential Library, Demo Day was the culmination of The Venture Center’s 12-week accelerator program for early stage businesses poised to disrupt the financial services industry. During the program, the 10 companies received in-depth mentoring and training from FIS and The Venture Center, as well as the opportunity to engage with more than 20 financial institutions.

Alto IRA, Nashville, Tenn., a fast and easy way to invest in alternative assets like real estate and private equity with a self-directed IRA account.

Bond.AI, New York City, N.Y., an omnichannel conversational intelligence platform for banks that analyzes bank data in context to various needs and enables interaction between banks and their consumers through voice (Alexa, Siri, Onstar) & text (SMS, messenger) channels.

eGiftify, London, England, provides banks and businesses with innovative gifting, payment and client marketing solutions that can be sent via email, SMS, social media or print.

Quotanda, Mexico City, Mexico, is a lending-as-a-service (LaaS) platform that enables lenders and schools to efficiently launch and manage student financing programs (loans and scholarships) to make education more affordable.

“These companies have demonstrated their capacity to bring world class solutions to solving problems and challenges in the FinTech space” said Wayne Miller, managing director of The Venture Center’s VC FinTech Accelerator. “Each of them has made tremendous progress toward proving that their team can execute while clearly validating their value proposition to enable banks to better serve their customers in a changing digital world.”

Each company selected a member of the community to introduce them. Governor Asa Hutchinson and FIS President and CEO Gary Norcross also provided remarks.

“We were pleased with the level of interest and participation we saw from clients, investors and community leaders, which speaks to the innovation and ingenuity shown by all of the participating companies,” Norcross said.

Rob Lee, chief product officer for FIS, closed the event by announcing that that FIS has formally partnered with FundSeeder of Westport, Connecticut, and Hexanika of New York City, two of the startups that completed last year's inaugural accelerator.

The 2017 program received 295 applications from startup financial technology firms across the U.S. and 39 other countries. Download the 2017 VC FinTech Program Booklet. Applications for the Summer 2018 program open on September 20, 2017. Visit www.vcfintech.co to learn more or to apply for next year's program.